Will Smith And Jada Pinkett Smith Gave Jaden Smith A Vegan Intervention
That’s not to say they arranged a circle of chairs upholstered in only man-made materials and shared confessional letters while passing around a plate of tempeh nuggets. I’m talking about Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith holding an intervention for Jaden Smith, regarding his vegan diet.
Will and Jada got into a conversation about food during the latest episode of Red Table Talk. Usually the conversation is between Jada, Willow Smith, and Jada’s mom Adrienne Banfield-Jones. But they opened the table up to the boys as well (Will, Jaden, and Trey Smith). It started after Will admitted he’d gained some weight while on vacation after the end of the promotional tour for Aladdin. Will said he’s a grazer, while Jada admitted she’s the opposite, and that she often would just rather not eat. Jaden apparently is the same as his mom, and that got to be a problem when Jaden started looking like a tired zombie.
“Will and I had a bit of an intervention with Jaden because he’s a vegan now, but we realized he wasn’t getting enough protein. So he was wasting away. He just looked drained, he was just depleted, he wasn’t getting the nutrients.”
I always thought Jaden got his nutrients from the energy emitted from the sky when Saturn passed the fourth moon of Jupiter (nutrients filtered through the cleansing smoke of intergalactic cedar wood). No, he gets them from food, just like the rest of us. Will added that they knew something was up, because his skin was looking a little grey, and he had dark circles under his eyes.
Jaden was very committed to the vegan life for a while. Earlier this summer, he opened a vegan pop-up food truck to feed the homeless. He even tried to get his parents into vegan eating. Two years ago, he accused The Four Seasons in Toronto of trying to kill him after he found cheese in his vegan pancakes. But he’s not vegan anymore.
“I also just wanna say that I’m vegetarian, that I’ve tried to be vegan. I’m vegetarian, you know, I’ve tried to eat vegan meals. I’ll go vegan for a week or so but for the past year I’ve been vegetarian. I was just eating like two meals a day…maybe one. Maybe just that one big meal, and I’m like, ‘Oh, you know, I didn’t get around to [eating]’.”
I’m not a vegan nutritionist, but I’m guessing those eye circles and pallid complexion had less to do with tofu, almond milk, and cashew cheez, and more to do with the fact he was only eating once a day. And it’s not like he could just pick up a quick vegan snack if he swung by his parents house either. He’d pause at the fruit bowl, and think, “You know what? I better not – they could be saving one of these for something.”